The movie never ends
by hellomiserable
Summary: In this oneshot revisitation to The Soprano's end, Tony faces his nightmares when he has to confront the world by himself.


_**Disclaimer**_: The Sopranos is a work of fiction owned by the one and only David Chase. I do not claim ownership of any of his characters. I do not intend to profit on them either, my purpose is merely academic and personal. Contact me if you have got any questions.

**The movie never ends**

Tony Soprano was with his wife and kids on a nice little diner downtown eating onion rings ("the best in the state, as far as I'm concerned!"), where the jukebox was playing one of his favorite tunes. No one was annoying him with requests or complaints he didn't care about, therefore it was a great and rare moment to be remembered. They were having a great time indeed, considering the last years and how little time they had spent together just having fun. And what could go wrong now that the war was over and all those pricks from New York were dead? Now that he could finally spend time with Meadow and A.J., who were grown up and were finding their own ways in life. He was feeling so proud of these two kids. Tony didn't want to admit it to himself for a long time, but he was more than glad that his children were at least a little involved with the family business. At least this way…

Blank.

_What could go wrong_? Another panic attack, of course.

Tony found himself in a wide, clean, and very white hospital room. As if he was the only thing in color there. "What's up with this white weird shit?", he whispered to himself. Soon after realizing he was there by himself, he started panicking: "Madonn', and where the hell is everybody? Jeez, what the hell happened?"

"Hello? Is there anybody out there? Where the hell am I? What did you do to my family, you shitheads?" he screamed to the top of his lungs. Suddenly, he heard the gunshots and smelled the blood. The nausea invaded his whole body, he was so sick he had to throw up instantly. Flashbacks. They were repeatedly showing images in thousand different angles of everybody in his family dead, all covered in blood. As if he could not control his brain, they appeared over and over. It was frightening. He threw up again.

Carmela, Anthony Junior, Meadow, all his family was dead. Tony Soprano was another meaningless and lonely human being. A pathetic human being, he thought. He was not even sure he had any power, any position or any place left in the Family. And he'd better hide, considering that he had no idea what was going on with the Families by this time (and _what _time this was, how long was he unconscious, anyway?). When he realized all these things, his first impulse was to jump out of bed, take all that vomit out of his face and rip out all of those wires that were attached to him. His gigantic body, breaking and throwing everything within eyesight with pure rage made him look less human, more like some sort of mad animal, sad animal. Tony, not being able to stop thinking about those images of his dead family, turned the beautiful and spotless white room in its complete opposite: the image of chaos, of anger. By this point, he had to leave that place, he could no longer breath there. He got in his clothes, they were on the other side of his room, when suddenly a nurse appeared. He knew what he had to do the second she started screaming, looking for help. He punched her and left her there, lying on the floor. "Funny thing", he thought, "she looked a lot like Adriana. Hope I didn't hurt her too bad". There were still tears on his eyes.

He was back on the street. "Jesus, I'm not sure I can even walk straight. I'm just so fucking numb with pain, like that damn song, but no way this shit is comfortable." Tony perhaps had never felt so many feelings, contradictory feelings, at the same time. He was feeling free, surprisingly, although extremely apprehensive of walking on the streets without knowing how his position was standing ("but I'm a motherfucking boss, the hell with it! I can kill all those fuckers!" he sometimes thought), but he was also feeling the deepest grief he had ever experienced, what lead to a feeling of powerlessness and depression that he had not felt for years. "I wonder where the hell is that Prozac, because I could easily just whack myself right here", was something else that ran through his mind.

He walked aimlessly on the streets, where he could see was still New Jersey, wondering about his life and everything he had conquered until that day, and in the possibility that maybe everything was gone. He felt exhausted just to think about starting all over again. He did not want that, he _would_ _not _start all over again. A SVU passed by him in high velocity, with loud music and people laughing, maybe even drinking. "I can swear that that douchebag driving really looks like Christopher. That son of a bitch, I'm glad I wiped him out, after all."

Tony had walked miles and miles until he realized he was in the old neighborhood. "Here we go, memory lane", he thought. "You know what? I'm going to the house. It has to be there and it's _my_ house, goddamnit, people still have the decency of not invading other people's properties. Maybe Janice will be there with Domenica. I think I can put up with her right now, after all, she's my goddamn sister… and well, at least she can cook."

Arriving at the big house in North Caldwell, Tony was sweating like a pig and breathing very heavily. Because of the quietness of the streets, his loud breath intensified to a point that it seemed as if it were the only sound in the world. Tony was anxious, he was used to having his problems fixed right away, and all the memories of the life he built at that house that came to his mind made him want to fix the situation right at that moment, and because he obviously could not have this, the frustration was huge.

The house was deserted, and it creeped the hell out of him. Everything was exactly in its right place, very clean, and there was no sign of robbery or vandalism. He looked outside at the yard. The ducks were at the pool, like they had never left, years ago. Tony felt an enormous and strange emptiness inside, "Damn, and I was suppose to feel good about these ducks". There was nothing else to lose, everything was weirdly upside down.

"I gotta find Melfi. I think I'm going mad or something and she may be the only one I can still trust" he said to himself, only to come to reality again "and I don't even know if I still have my friggin' car anymore. Fuck." And yet, there it was. The Escalade was intact inside the garage, with the keys inside, as if it was waiting to be driven somewhere.

The empty streets encouraged Tony to take a quick detour and pass in front of Satriale's to see what was going on. He slowed considerably and risked being spotted to take a peek inside his old place. This time there were no watery eyes, no nostalgia or anything of this nature. He was cold and alert. Ready to attack, if the situation required. What he saw through the dark windows, though, was nothing threatening, but only what seemed to be the shadow of Bobby Bacala carrying a huge meat package. "That fat fuck Bacala! Don't tell me he has risen or something? What's next? Ma, you're there to make me miserable too?", he was screaming at this point, not understanding a single thing that was going on, like little kid who is left alone and is scared to death, but also angry at the world.

He parked his car and went inside Jennifer Melfi's office. What Tony was expecting was some little piece of normality, something that enabled him to rest from all this chaos outside. However, what he found was only more frustration: only the waiting room walls - no chairs, no weird art work (which made him glad for a second, those paintings have always struck Tony as some Freudian manipulatory bullshit), no windows, no drapes. Only that damn singing fish hanging on the wall, by her door. Tony thought of Pussy and felt nothing at all. He realized he was wearing a watch. It was a quarter to three in the afternoon. It was almost time. He sat on the floor and stood there, in the dark, waiting.

"Hello Mr. Soprano. You're early today. Come in, would you?"

Coming like this, from the light, she looked almost heavenly. Beautiful.

He stood up, walked calmly towards her. Jennifer slowly, almost in slow motion, enveloped Tony in her arms in a extremely loving and caring way.

(…)

"TONY, wake up!" It was a female voice, but...

"The hell just happened...", Tony could barely speak, he was half asleep in his dream, still in Melfi's warm and comforting arms.

"Get up already, goddammit! Have you seen what time is it? Have you lost your mind, sleeping 'till three o'clock in the afternoon?" Yes, it was definitely Carmela.

"Ok, ok, calm down. I'm getting up. Jeez, what the hell..."

"Don't forget about the arrangements we made for tonight, ok? I want to see this family closer again. It's not because the children are leaving the house and getting their independence that we are gonna stop being a proper family. Do you understand this?"

That night, they were going to have dinner at a diner downtown. Tony did not feel like going, he already had enough headaches, but fighting about this with Carmela would also give him a headache, so it would be much easier to just go and enjoy some onion rings. When he arrived, he instantly ordered some the appetizers and put "Don't Stop Believing", from Journey, on the jukebox. Then Carmela arrived. She tried to talk to him about what was going on, but he did not feel like sharing any of his problems, Tony was extremely tired and what good would it do, anyway? Carmela looked tired too. So they just stood there, listening to the music and reading the menu. A.J. got there soon after that, "He looks a little better, the poor kid.", Tony thought. "Maybe he's finally getting somewhere with this new job. It's about time, I guess". He loved his son unconditionally, although he could not understand that boy, and how could he act with such stupidity sometimes. It drove Tony mad to a point that he wanted to hit A.J. in the face.

Meadow was outside having problems to park her car when the waitress brought the onion rings to the table. "This feels so damn familiar", Tony started to recall something about a crazy dream that he had that night, but quickly dropped that thought because there she was, Meadow.

THE END.


End file.
